“Furthermore it has been said, “Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.” But I say to you that whoever divorces his wife for any reason except sexual immorality causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a woman who is divorced commits adultery.” Matthew 5:31-32

Jesus is an advocate of marriage and an enemy of divorce. There is only one reason He allows for divorce and that is sexual immorality. If you divorce someone for any other reason you will cause them to commit adultery if they ever remarry, since in God’s eyes the divorce never happened.

Likewise, we must be cautious in whom we marry. If we marry someone who unlawfully divorced we will enter into adultery ourselves, since God still sees that person with the unlawful divorce as married. We must not cause others to sin, and we must be careful not to enter into the sin of others ourselves. Of course, mistakes are made and there is always repentance and forgiveness… but that should not be in our decision making process.

Paul in 1 Corinthians 7:10-11 reiterates this, that the Lord commands a husband not to divorce his wife, nor should a woman leave her husband. He does give his personal opinion in the following verses that if a believer is married to an unbeliever and the unbeliever wants to depart, then let them depart. This is the exception though, not the rule.

What’s the big deal; can’t people just do what makes them happy? The big deal is that God made marriage, and expects us to keep our vows. You signed up for this. Marriage is important to God because it is representative of our relationship with God in heaven. We are the bride of Christ, Jesus is the groom. He promises faithfulness to us. He told us he would be with us till the end of the age and promises to never leave nor forsake us.

Jesus doesn’t ask from us what He isn’t willing to do Himself. If we want to have this sort of relationship with Him, it is only fair that we have it with our fellow mankind. If you want the world to know how much Jesus loves them, make your marriage a visual picture of it.